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So this is how the story goes. In 1826 a London merchant decides to buy some cloth from a weaver in Hawick, a town in the Scottish borders famous for its cloth production. Very happy with his order, he decides to get some more but – crucially – misreads the weaver’s dashed handwriting. Instead of ‘twill’ this Londoner reads ‘tweed’, and assumes this new cloth must take after the River Tweed which runs fast and clear through the textile areas of lower Scotland. ‘Tweed’ and not ’twill’ has been the term used ever since.

“The St. Lawrence is mere water. The Missouri muddy water. The Thames is liquid history.” So declared John Burns – a great advocate of London’s history – when asked to compare the Thames against those other great rivers in 1929. Forty years earlier in 1889 Burns had been a towering figurehead of the Great Dock Strike, thus sealing his own place in those murky waters. As the 125th anniversary of the strike approaches (14 August – 16 September) it feels an opportune moment to reflect on what this particular passage of liquid history might mean today.

When the Uniform penny post rocked up in 1840, it completely revolutionised the way in which people communicated. Sending letters and cards, such as those celebrating Valentine’s Day, became easier and cheaper and as a result a thriving business developed in central London.

Ever wondered how to pack and store your wedding dress? The Museum of London’s Senior Curator of Fashion and Decorative Arts, Beatrice Behlen, shows us how using a beautiful silk gown from the collection.

While rummaging around for objects (okay, while I was carefully perusing the hanging bays) for a project I am working on at the moment , I came upon this Schiaparelli-esque jacket: I love the fabric, an eau de nil damask with a pattern of golden-yellowy flies and particularly how they were made to charge towards each other around some of the seams. Here is a close-up of one of the buttons (the top front button has come off, but thankfully we still have it): The jacket was donated in 1977 together with three evening dresses, which I will check out […]